


Piles of Trash

by Hotalando



Series: Frozen Top [2]
Category: Pocket Monsters | Pokemon (Main Video Game Series), Pocket Monsters | Pokemon - All Media Types
Genre: Caretaking, Hurt/Comfort, Internal Conflict, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-11
Updated: 2018-05-11
Packaged: 2019-05-05 01:39:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,469
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14606367
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hotalando/pseuds/Hotalando
Summary: Four years after descending Mt. Shirogane and failed attempts at returning to his lifestyle, Red finds it most comfortable in piles of trash.





	Piles of Trash

## Piles of Trash

 **Too bright**. When he decides to quit sleeping to wake up.  
**Too loud**. When he moves to sit up and tries to find a way out from under the sheets.  
**Too shrill**. Is the echo of the Loudred’s cry in his head that woke him up from his slumber.  
**Too early**. To be up on his feet when he only got into bed four hours ago.  
**Too early**. For the day to be forwarded to lunch time already.  
**Too early**. As he can’t be bothered with the mess of hair his head carries around again.

He grabs the red and white cap from his dresser and forces it over his head—not that anyone would see him today. It would just be another day on the couch again, with the League broadcast on TV and tens of thousands of cans of whatever there is left in the fridge. Maybe yesterday’s pizza too but he isn’t so sure about its existence anymore—did he eat it last night? Did somebody else? It had a little too much BBQ sauce on, it could be in Pikachu’s clutch—then perhaps he would again lure in that Loudred to pick up some pizza for him. 

Sleep blurs his vision as he steps down the memorised staircase and immediately sinks into a pool of trash. As high as the lowest step the outdated, used boxes and packagings of the past two weeks League broadcast on TV pile up on the living-room floor, thinning out towards the front door. Unfazed by it, he wades through the marsh of rubbish and finds the deepest spot around the coffee table and couch. 

Something inside of him wants to call out for his mother to finally tidy up—how should _he_ do it, after all he _has_ to watch the League broadcast on TV—but he mostly knows by now that she’s really on vacation in another region. 

Already exhausted from the effort, he drags himself back to the kitchen to grab as many drinks as he can carry and strides through the sea of waste back to the couch. His behind barely touches the cushion, the TV is turned on already and he flicks the remote back somewhere to his feet—he wouldn’t need it anymore until he has to switch the screen on again. 

It’s past 1p.m. and he has probably missed half of today’s tournaments already but he doesn’t care that much about any of them. What matters are only the names of the finalists, not those of the losers from the preliminaries. And he wouldn’t even remember the winners’ names at the end anyway. None of it has any value to him. Not the names. Not the trainers. Maybe their choice of pokemon, perhaps their teamwork, mostly their strategy. Mostly, he would just lie there and either rant over the current competitors’ stupidity or fall asleep. And in between his outbursts and naps he would be as mute as ever. 

Rarely he would think how his supervision could improve one of the trainers, how being a tutor again sounded like a good idea. If he didn’t have to get up from his couch, out of the house, through the outer world to reach out to someone who might or might not be able to adapt to his teachings. 

Often then he would ask himself what had changed in the last four years. Why does lazing about feel better than training outside? When has being _Red the Pokemon master_ become just a memory in his dreams?

Never would he try to give it a try again.

Lazing about seems so much more convenient. 

Unless a visitor stops by. 

 

Feet insensitively kick trash around as they try to approach the couch in the center of the room, some week old soda cans land on the person sprawled on the sofa. 

“Hey, brainfreeze,” says the brown-haired intruder with a key and slumps down on the resident’s feet. 

They wordlessly arrange themselves on the couch, opposite from another and legs awkwardly yet comfortably entangled. While one keeps his eyes on the TV screen, the other grabs the magazine he dropped the other day on the coffee table and picks up reading the article from where he left off yesterday.

After a while—on his way into slumber lands—Red turns towards the man across from him. For about a week they spend afternoons together like this, silently, lacking interactions but their feet and legs touching and at 10 o’clock in the evening, they would separate again. As convenient and as nice it is to have company while watching the League broadcast on TV, Red somehow feels agitated by only lying on his butt whenever the other man is there. 

Maybe that was something he wanted to return to—their physical interactions and intellectual exchanges, rather than just spending time inside each other’s peripheral bubble. Perhaps this is the time to give it a try.

“I wonder if… y’know we could do something else. Like get into a brawl together… or into bed,” Red suggests with a pseudo-smirk on his face, never has been one to flirt but he knows what his partner likes. 

Without looking up from the magazine, the answer is spoken in a casual tone, “And I wonder if you could maybe clean up, _y’know_.”

Red lets his head drop backwards onto the armrest. “Oh c’mon, Green! Let me get some rest before mum comes back. I’mma clean it all up before she even lands in Kanto.”

“Tomorrow then?” Green glances over the magazine with a skeptical look—and finds pure shock written all over the former champion’s face. Unsurprised by the reaction, the Viridian Gym Leader continues flipping through the magazine, “Impressive.”

“Why the fuck didn’t you tell me sooner!” Red demands but feels too lethargic to move. He spent most of the past two weeks—how? how does time even work?—horizontally positioned somewhere, all of his stamina is used up by the attention-seeking Loudred shrieking him awake every day.

“Your mum was kind enough to put a big sign up on the fridge. And remember when I told you to take out the trash?”

“No–”

“Yeah, me neither. It’s hilarious,” Green grins sadistically for a second, “But seriously, you gotta clean up. Not just the house. You reek, man.”

The League broadcast long muted in the background, Red watches Green intently who acts to ignore him for the oh-so-fascinating magazine on Gym interior designs. That damned jerk—always such a smartass, babying him and siding with his mum—does he really think that would change anything? That this kind of treatment would make him step outside his routine?

Frustrated by Green’s lack of cooperation and support, Red sits up and grabs one of the trash bags someone set on the table for him. He would clean up for it would cut short the motherly speech of care and scold and he would only have to blank out the talk about his inactivity as trainer. And his finances. And his hygiene. And his lack of prospects. 

“I recommend you shower first—it’s really gross.” Green interrupts his actions by kicking the empty soda can he’s just picked up out of his hand. “ **Take a shower**.”

Rolling his eyes, Red gives in, “Fine.” 

 

And by the time he’s back from the everlasting, energy-draining shower, the last two weeks are collected in several trash bags in front of the entry door. There’s a smiling Green sitting at the kitchen table, a cup of accomplishment in his hand and the magazine again in his focus. The League broadcast isn’t on TV anymore.

“I would’ve cleaned up—honestly,” Red says earnestly and joins Green at the table. 

“I believe you but I wanted it to happen in reality,” Green simply counters without looking up—then closes his magazine to face his opposite. “Do you know how tough it was to get your mum to accept the vacation offer? She’s been caring for your lazy ass for years now—even before you left for Mt. Shirogane. She’s been worrying so much about you and I bet she couldn’t even enjoy any of the free time because she can’t stop worrying about you. She doesn’t deserve to come home to her son turning into Muk.” There is true concern in his voice, admiration for that woman even, but also irritation over Red’s inappropriate behaviour. 

To layer his deeper rooted concerns with his usual mocky manner, Green rolls the magazine up and hits Red on the head with it as he moves to leave, “Be a better son.

And next time when she’s in Alola, I might get into bed with you,” he ends the conversation and disappears through the door along with the piles of trash.


End file.
